Best First Page of Any Book Ever?

28 thoughts on “Best First Page of Any Book Ever?

  1. KIDRoach

    The title is such a cliche.

    Then, everything in the first page goes south the more you read it. This book is beyond bad. I wonder why would anyone even bother to publish this book?

  2. Mel C

    I’m going to guess (wildly) that this is a self-published book, because any self-respecting editor would have thrown this in the garbage and not even bothered to fix it. But that’s just me, assuming again…

  3. Blรฉ

    Well, it looks bad, but not any worse than some books for pre-teens I’ve read when I was in school.

  4. Stephen

    This is why 10 year old boys should not have computers. Come back when you learn to spell, punctuate, and THINK! Other than that, it’s pretty, er, terrible.

  5. Drew Clarke

    Its cack, not funny or clever and not good enough to be a cliche or a pastiche.

    Face it people, bad is bad

  6. EnergyGuy

    The Amazon reviews are even better! Did someone hack into Amazon and upload fake reviews? I was just starting to trust the reviews there, and now this ….

  7. Willard

    Yep, you might want to check the STEWpendous revue’s at Amazon.com. But ignore awl 5 doz. Five-starr ones. Hears why:

    Absolutely terrible, July 2, 2009
    By Jonathan Kessler (Chicago, IL USA)
    “Seriously? This is possibly the worst written piece of literature ever created. The author has the worst grammar I’ve ever seen. The few pages I’ve seen read like an 8 year old wrote them.
    Oh, and all of the reviews have the same style as the book.. because the author faked ALL of them.

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    woW like coulda been a reel gude buk but it wznt, July 2, 2009
    By ramazon (California, USA)
    “I wanna like totally really read this book cuz from the reveiws it seams like it coulda been da bomb. but I’m worreed becuz I’m afraid the grammer level mite be too hard for me. I wish the awethor could have maid it easier for peeple like me to reed it.”

    ——————————–

    Moon People: Childish and Badly Written, July 2, 2009
    By D. E. Wise “Technical Editor” (Birmingham, AL USA)
    “I have read Mr. Courtney’s sample pages (Chapter 1, page 1; Chapter 9, page 1). Had you told me they were written by a 6th Grader, I would have believed you. On the basis of the sample pages alone, I would never, unless required to for an editing class (as an example of Bulwer-Lytton at his worst), purchase even a used copy of this book. I have been a technical editor for 50 years, and if Mr. Courtney ever decides to write another book, he can contact me for a quotation of my service fees. Lord knows he needs an editor! Desparately!

    ——————————–

    Crap, July 1, 2009
    By C. Brown
    “This book is the most outrageous insult to the English language ever.Reads like it was written by a retarded chimp (sorry if I insulted any real retarded chimps!).”

    ——————————–

    What’s with these comments?, July 1, 2009
    By A. Kowalski
    ?Are all of these comments ironic or just all written by the author? I will admit I have only read two pages of this book but my god, it sounds like it was written by a 4th grader who learned English as a third language . Reading the Pages and the commens on the Book with the mispallings and Inappropriate capiTalizations made me lose faith in Humanity but i kept reading because they so interesting and I couldn’t stop because each one Was better than the first and they were Very interesting…no more need said, Buy book it change my and your life Together.”

  8. the knower

    anybody got a better first page?
    The Hobbit is up there.

    gotta cast mine for The Gunslinger

  9. bartleby

    Sarcasm, people, sarcasm.

    Of COURSE this is the result of the self-publishing explosion.
    Golly, gee, I can write and publish my own book! And it’ll be set in type, just like a real book! With a real cover, and real chapters, and . . . and . . . and . . .

  10. David Strong

    It seems like there used to be something like “Snoopy Awards” for opening lines that could compete with “It was a dark and stormy night.” There were always some amazing attempts.

  11. Paul Burke - Author Journey Home

    “It was a dark and stormy night” is my favorite opening line of all time. There is none better…long live Snoopy and his precious Van Gogh. My favorite opening for a television show is Dark Shadows – in black and white – great music, great graphics just beautifully over the top.

    A word about Xlibris. They are in the business to bill authors. They do have a copy editing service but that also costs money. This author probably spent a couple of grand to put this book out. It’s unfortunate that he trusted Xlibris.

    When I used Xlibris for my novel “Journey Home” I submitted the book in the electronic format they directed me to use. When I received the first galley it was butchered.

    A lot of Dale’s Moon mistakes very easily could have come from the Xlibris format conversion process. However our Moon author should have poured over the galley. He should have never signed off on it until it was a right as could be and had a second pair of eyes look for mistakes.

    It took me 27 iterations to get my galley right. There are still some apostrophes missing but after being reduced to tears and frustrated beyond belief I got the book close enough and signed off on the 27th galley. I kid you not.

    Those 27 rounds of corrections also cost me money. Every time I would submit a correction a new one would crop up where there hadn’t been one before. My customer support people all spoke English as a second language. It was an unbelievable struggle. Characters names literally appeared inside of words.

    For instance the word America came back to me in the galley’s as “AmeriBenca” and not just once but replicated throughout the whole book. There’s a form and format to complete and fill out for each mistake. Ben is one of the characters in the book. That’s just one example the formatting fiasco was rampant. You want to talk tortured artist talk to me.

    I muscled it through and in the end it was worth it but not financially. Although “Journey Home” has received glowing reviews from anyone who has read it (and that in and of itself is over the top rewarding) the lack of a Simon and Schuster pushing it has made the marketing of it a huge struggle. Who knows if Xlibris is reporting back to me the actual number of sales based on incompetence more than any real intent to rip me off. Some fun, ehh?

    But in the end the book is out there now finally for the curious and open minded to find…..and so you never know and keep the faith.

    Paul
    Author-Journey Home

  12. Dan M

    See, this right here is why self-publishing shouldn’t exist. No one needs to read this. This may or may not be a good story, but it needs a ghostwriter, proofreader and editor. Or just to be thrown in the fireplace. Either way.

  13. Rosa

    Wow. That was horrible. Even for just the first page… and the faked reviews, at the least, he could have TRIED to use a dictionary. Er. They used actual numbers? This person most likely doesn’t know how to write a proper story. I could definitely write better then this, and I am twelve. Self publishing isn’t bad, unless crappy stuff like this is submitted.

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